The plaintiff, Gary Cooney, filed a two-count complaint against the defendants, Society of Mt. Carmel, Edward Gunkel, and Thomas Meyers, alleging negligence in one count and willful and wanton misconduct on the part of the defendants in the second count. The trial court dismissed both counts and the plaintiff herein appeals from the order dismissing count II.

In 1969, plaintiff Cooney was a 13-year-old student at Mt. Carmel High School in Chicago, a Roman Catholic high school owned and operated by defendant Society of Mt. Carmel. The complaint was filed on November 28, 1975, after plaintiff had reached majority and alleged that defendants Gunkel and Meyers, physical education instructors, were negligent in refusing to excuse plaintiff from certain physical education classes, and, in count II, that defendants Gunkel and Meyers exhibited willful and wanton misconduct that proximately caused injury to the plaintiff.

Defendants moved to strike count I on the ground that negligence actions against school officials were barred by the Illinois School Code (Ill. Rev. Stat. 1975, ch. 122, par. 24-24). Defendants then moved to strike count II of the complaint on the ground that plaintiff had failed to file the requisite notice under the Local Governmental and Governmental Employees Tort Immunity Act (Ill. Rev. Stat. 1975, ch. 85, par. 8-102).

After the filing of supportive memoranda and oral argument, the trial court dismissed both counts. The plaintiff appeals from the dismissal of count II striking the claim for failure to comply with the notice requirement of the statute in question.

Plaintiff argues that the statute's lengthy enumeration of the governmental units covered by the Act does not mention private schools, and, therefore, there can be no inference of a legislative intent to so provide.

We agree.

The Tort Immunity Act extends certain protections to local public entities. Section 1-206 defines these public entities as follows:

"`Local public entity' includes a county, township, municipality, municipal corporation, school district, school board, forest preserve district, park district, fire protection district, sanitary district, and all other local governmental bodies. It does not include the State or any office, officer, department, division, bureau, board, commission, university or similar agency of the State." Ill. Rev. Stat. 1975, ch. 85, par. 1-206.

In reaching this decision, it is useful to note some of the history behind the concept of governmental tort immunity. The concept of governmental immunity is a carry-over from the common law and the monarchial era's sovereign immunity, wherein monarchs were presumed incapable of doing wrong. Illinois first granted tort immunity in the 19th century to towns, counties, and school districts. (Kinnare v. City of Chicago (1898), 171 Ill. 332, 49 N.E. 536; Town of Waltham v. Kemper (1870), 55 Ill. 346.) However, the Illinois Supreme Court recently rejected the whole notion of sovereign governmental immunities and abolished the immunities previously granted, setting off a flurry of legislative activity to restore them to some degree. Walker v. Forest Preserve District (1963), 27 Ill.2d 538, 190 N.E.2d 296; Molitor v. Kaneland Community Unit District No. 302 (1959), 18 Ill.2d 11, 163 N.E.2d 89.

In our examination of the range of legislation and the case law on the subject, one thing is clear  the statutory language in all the legislation involved is the clear and unequivocal intent of the legislature to immunize specifically named governmental units against tort liability.

 1, 2 The appellees cite extensive case authority for the proposition that the court's interpretation of the School Code favors equal treatment with respect to tort liability among public and private schools. This is true, but these cases do not address themselves to the issue before us in the case at bar. In Kobylanski v. Chicago Board of Education (1976), 63 Ill.2d 165, 347 N.E.2d 705, the court found that the ...

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